Abstract
The tendency to reflect on the emotions of self and others is a key aspect of emotional awareness (EA)—a trait widely recognized as relevant to mental health. However, the degree to which EA draws on general reflective cognition vs. specialized socio-emotional mechanisms remains unclear. Based on a synthesis of work in neuroscience and psychology, we recently proposed that EA is best understood as a learned application of domain-general cognitive processes to socio-emotional information. In this paper, we report a study in which we tested this hypothesis in 448 (125 male) individuals who completed measures of EA and both general reflective cognition and socio-emotional performance. As predicted, we observed a significant relationship between EA measures and both general reflectiveness and socio-emotional measures, with the strongest contribution from measures of the general tendency to engage in effortful, reflective cognition. This is consistent with the hypothesis that EA corresponds to the application of general reflective cognitive processes to socio-emotional signals.
Highlights
The tendency to reflect on the emotions of self and others is a key aspect of emotional awareness (EA)—a trait widely recognized as relevant to mental health
Levels of Emotional Awareness Scale (LEAS), Geneva emotion recognition test (GERT-S), and MINI-K scores were greater in females than in males, while CRT-7, actively open-minded thinking scale (AOMTS), and comprehensive assessment of rational thinking (CART) scores were greater in males than in females
As a further exploratory analysis, we examined correlations between these measures and TAS-20 scores to assess whether self-reported difficulties associated with emotional awareness might show a similar pattern as found for the LEAS
Summary
The tendency to reflect on the emotions of self and others is a key aspect of emotional awareness (EA)—a trait widely recognized as relevant to mental health. EA appears to require holding emotional information in mind, integrating it with other available information in perception and memory, and using this information to reflectively plan adaptive courses of action (especially in social situations) While these abilities may be constrained by cognitive capacity (e.g., working memory span, IQ;32), it is suggested that trait differences in EA may further depend on the tendency to engage these reflective processes, independent of whether latent cognitive capacity is high or low. We predicted that higher EA would be associated with both the domain-general and emotion-specific measures, as opposed to only the emotion-specific measures (as might be expected if EA were entirely dependent on distinct socio-emotional mechanisms) If this prediction were confirmed, it would support our previously proposed hypothesis regarding how EA emerges through the interaction between affective signals and general reflective cognitive processes
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
